Field
Aspects of the present invention relate to a portable terminal that performs a printer search using Bluetooth®.
Description of the Related Art
To issue a print instruction from a mobile terminal, a user has to select a printing apparatus on the mobile terminal's display. To enable a user to select a printing apparatus, the mobile terminal searches for printing apparatuses, and displays the result of the search. As a means for searching for printing apparatuses from a mobile terminal, a method of determining the sequential order of the connection requests of plural printers based on search signal intensity is disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2013-162381. A mobile terminal, for example, can receive a Bluetooth® signal from a device, such as printing device, where the device advertises information associated with the device via the Bluetooth® signal (hereinafter referred to as “Advertise of Bluetooth” or “Advertise”). The mobile terminal, upon receipt of the Bluetooth® signal, adds the printing devices providing the Bluetooth® signal into a printer list in the descending order of radio wave intensity. The user selects one printing apparatus from among those in the printer list displayed on the mobile terminal, and issues an instruction for execution of print processing.
When printing is performed using near-field wireless communication, such as Bluetooth®, the speed of communication is lower than in a case where a wireless LAN is used. Therefore, there is a method of, after performing a printer search by using near-field wireless communication, transmitting print data by switching to wireless LAN. However, in some cases, the printer found as a result of a near-field wireless search cannot perform wireless LAN communication, though it can use its near-field wireless function. Examples of such cases include where a wireless LAN setting is OFF in the printer, the printer is out of order, or the printer is on a different subnetwork than the mobile terminal. In such cases, the printer found via near-field wireless communication cannot actually be used for printing.